2008 Un Certain Regard Selections: Strong Batch of Contempo Auteurs make up Slate

Apart from film examples such as The Band’s Visit, Munyurangabo (Liberation Day) and Terror’s Advocate, last year’s Un Certain Regard Section had its share of misfires – films that took the experimental route but felt more like – old bath tub water. This year’s batch of twenty titles includes another mix of veteran and first time filmmakers with perhaps the James Toback’s bio-docu on friend (Iron Mike) Tyson, Abel Ferrara’s
latest work Chelsea On The Rocks and finally Bong Joon Ho, Leos Carax and Michel Gondry collab Tokyo! to garner the most attention from buyers and critic crowds.

The five films I’m most looking forward to are Germany’s Wolke 9 by Andreas Dresen, Los Bastardos by Amat Escalante (he is the was the DOP for Carlos Reygadas’ first two films and a couple of years back he released another dismal portrait of Mexico with Sangre. From Norway we get Bent Hamer’s latest O’ Horten, Japan’s Kiyoshi Kurosawa might be expanding his genre tastes with Tokyo Sonata and after Old Joy, Kelly Reichardt offers a sophomore project called Wendy And Lucy.

As predicted, the section offers many French films and on total we find six new filmmakers whole be in contention for the famed Camera D’Or. Those with an asterix: first time filmmakers.

Un Certain Regard 2008 line-up

Tokyo!, dir: Bong Joon Ho, Leos Carax, Michel Gondry (France)
*Afterschool, dir: Antonio Campos (US)
*Ting Che, dir: Chung Mong-Hong (Taiwan)
Soi Cowboy, dir: Thomas Clay (UK)
La Vie Moderne (Profils Paysans), dir: Raymond Depardon (France)
Wolke 9, dir: Andreas Dresen (Germany)
*Tulpan, dir: Sergey Dvortsevoy (Germany)
Los Bastardos, dir: Amat Escalante (Mexico)
Chelsea On The Rocks, dir: Abel Ferrara (US)
Je Veux Voir, dir: Joana Hadjithomas, Khalil Joreige (France)
O’ Horten, dir: Bent Hamer (Norway-Germany)
*Milh Hadha Al-Bahr, dir: Annemarie Jacir (Palestine)
Tokyo Sonata, dir: Kiyoshi Kurosawa (Japan)
Yi Ban Haishui, Yi Ban Huoyan, dir: Fendou Liu (China)
*A Festa Da Menina Morta, dir: Matheus Nachtergaele (Brazil)
De Ofrivilliga, dir: Ruben Ostlund (Sweden)
Wendy And Lucy: dir: Kelly Reichardt (US)
Johnny Mad Dog, dir: Jean-Stephane Sauvaire (France)
*Versailles, dir: Pierre Schoeller (France)
Tyson, dir: James Toback (US)